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Paul Beakley’s answer to this question was pretty spot on and I will steal its​ essence:

I have been gaming so long that it’s hard to remember how I may have been before I started. Honestly, I feel like I had an RPG-shaped hole in my heart and the hobby was basically invented so I could fill it. If anything, RPGs have simply given me an outlet for tendencies I already had.

That said, there’s no doubt that gaming has introduced me to people and made me some very close friends, and that it has helped me learn how to deal with both myself and with people. E.g., despite being an introvert, I have no problem talking in front of crowds or giving presentations. Having been in bands has helped with this, too, but so has running games for total strangers at cons.

Plus, gaming has also exposed me to people of all kinds of backgrounds I probably would never have known otherwise. The impact on my politics has been profound.

Plus… plus, there are more than a few genres and authors I’ve discovered via games. E.g., I go the Buffy RPG before I’d ever seen the show (My wife: “Happy Birthday! I think you’ll like this”), which prompted me to watch the show, and now my son’s middle name is “Joss”. Crazy!

Paul Beakley Yup. I may have half-watched an episode with my wife (S2E19, “I Only Have Eyes for You”, iirc), but I wasn’t paying any attention to the show as a thing. The game was what prompted me to look closer.

< ![CDATA[Paul Beakley Yup. I may have half-watched an episode with my wife (S2E19, “I Only Have Eyes for You”, iirc), but I wasn’t paying any attention to the show as a thing. The game was what prompted me to look closer.]]>